Evolution is one of the most important aspects of any Internet based company. Organizations like Facebook implement near constant changes. Some of the most common adaptations are made to the News Feed algorithm which determines what content users will see. These changes can often make it more difficult for companies to get their content seen without the use of ads, but there are still ways to do so.
There are many ways you can improve your News Feed performance and the best is to improve the reach of your content. Before we get into how you can do this, we should first describe what your Facebook reach is. Basically, your reach on Facebook is the number of unique users who see the content you post and your updates. When it comes to reach there are four actions you can take to influence it:
- Posting content on your own Page – This is commonly referred to as organic reach by Facebook.
- Facebook users interacting with your content – When users interact with the content on your Page e.g., commenting or sharing, this is shown in their News Feed, an act which Facebook calls viral reach.
- Sending users to view your content – This could be as simple as putting a link to your content on an email, or even on your website asking people to visit your Page. This is a form of organic reach.
- Paying to get content in front of people – This is using Facebook’s ad services and paying to target your content to specific audiences, thereby increasing the chance they see and interact with it. This is commonly referred to as paid reach.
By combining these four actions together, you can get a picture of your overall reach. By increasing the reach of each post through the above actions you stand a higher chance of getting your content in front of other people. The more people who see your updates the higher the chance of interaction with your company on Facebook or through other mediums, including avenues of sales.
The question is: How can a company do this? Here are seven of the most effective ways to improve your News Feed and its performance.
1. Develop A Strategy
The key to posts being shared is that they need to be useful and interesting to your audience. Take a look at your Page’s Insights (Open your Page’s Admin panel and click on Insights) to see what content has been popular with your followers. From there develop a content strategy that covers what content to produce, when it should be produced, and when it should be shared.
Take a look at the most popular posts and see when they were interacted with most. This will give you a good idea of when your followers are most active and likely to interact with your content – thus increasing reach and overall effectiveness of your posts.
2. Know Your Audience
This will take time and research, but you should be able to paint a pretty solid picture as to who your audience is. If you can define a few personalities or even target individuals, you can better come up with content your audience will be more willing to interact with, or be more receptive to should you promote it.
3. Let People Interact With Your Page
Some companies have allowed users to post content on their News Feed or even tag companies, having the post show up on the company’s News Feed, only for the content to be trolling or negative. This can potentially harm your company brand and reputation.
While there is a chance of this happening, the benefits of allowing your fans and followers to mention you in their posts far outweighs the potential negative outcomes of a few. This is because when a user mentions or tags you in a post on their News Feed, their friends are more likely to see it too. In other words, this can be a massive contributor to your overall viral reach.
4. Be Active After You Post Your Content
Don’t just post content onto your Page and leave it. If people are interacting with it by commenting then you should make an effort to reply to the comments. This shows that you are interested and responsive, and willing to communicate and create a dialogue.
Mentioning the poster using @username when you comment will highlight the name and post your comment on their News Feed, thereby increasing the number of people who view your original content and encouraging the commenter to return to your Page.
5. Don’t Be Afraid To Repost
If you have had successful posts in the past, don’t be afraid to reintroduce them. You could try updating the content a bit if need be and reposting it. This will increase the chance of other users seeing content they may have missed and interacting with it. Just be sure to comment somewhere that this content is a repost. You could comment that it was popular in the past and you think it is still relevant to today.
Be sure not to recycle too often however, as this can be viewed as lazy and turn users off. Aim for one to two posts every couple of months.
6. Integrate Successful Posts With Other Aspects Of Your Online Presence
While there is a good chance that your posts will be seen on Facebook, try boosting this by sharing your most popular content on other mediums. For example, paste the link into your email signature asking people to check it out, or add a list of your most popular posts to newsletters. This will encourage more people to visit the content and even interact with it.
In order to tell what is working, use the information on your Page’s Insight panel.
7. Don’t Be Afraid To Be Innovative
If you hit on a strategy that works, that’s great! But, you should not be afraid to try new ideas. If, for example, you see that captions on photo posts are becoming popular with your audience give one a try to see how it works. The key here is to be resourceful and always on the lookout for new ideas.
Looking to get more out of Facebook? Contact us today to see how we can help.
Published on 19th February 2014 by Jeanne DeWitt.
